The store will offer clothing and equipment for team
sports, fitness, camping, hunting and fishing. The Silverdale
location will be one of the first to include a “new and improved footwear section
designed to offer a broad selection of sports performance and
casual footwear,” according to the release.

The former Grainger building across
from Safeway could
soon be home to Bremerton’s fifth brewery.

Silverdale residents Dave and Dawn Dodge (pictured) bought the
Callow Avenue building last year and have applied for
licenses to begin brewing in a portion of the 11,000-square-foot
space. They hope to launch their
Bad Bulldog’s Brewery as early as December.

Dave is a retired Arizona police officer who home
brews beer and now works at Sound Brewery in Poulsbo.

“It was a blessing,” Dave said of landing his job at Sound,
which has familiarized him with brewing on a commercial scale.
“They’ve been really inviting to me.”

The Dodges plan to build
out their Bremerton brewery in stages. They’ll start by installing
a 3.5-barrel brewing system in the lower level of the building and
open a simple tasting room with a patio for outdoor
seating.

Later the couple will add a full-scale tasting room one of
the building’s street-level storefronts. A bar built around an
opening in the floor will allow patrons to sip beers while watching
brewers at work below.

Eventually the Dodges hope to transform the entire
building into a beer-centric hub. The structure encompasses
four separate commercial spaces with individual addresses, giving
them plenty of room to experiment. They envision hosting a home
brewers collective and perhaps a bottle shop.

The couple applied for a license to place a recreational
marijuana shop in the Grainger building, but were never
approved. They joined a class action lawsuit against the
Liquor and Cannabis Board with
the hope of still landing a license.

If they prevail, Bad Bulldog’s Brewery could share the building
with a marijuana store.

The discount “gives us an opportunity to showcase what we
have to offer,” he said.

More downtown activity is also helping draw attention to the
marina. A revamped Rock the
Dock concert series drew large crowds this summer (the
last concert of the season is Saturday).
Brewfest and the Harbor Festival are
popular with boaters.

The port continues to aggressively plug the marina on
social media, in magazine ads, and at boat shows. Revenue has
increased as slips filled up, but the facility is still far from
breaking even.

JCPenney is returning to
its department store roots this year with the rollout out of
appliance showrooms in 500 stores.

One of those stores is the
JCPenney in Silverdale, which will unveil its appliance
department Friday, according to a news release.

Each showroom will display more
than 100 name brand appliance models , including
refrigerators, stoves, dishwashers, washers and dryers. The store
will offer no-interest financing, free delivery and a price match
guarantee.

Nearly 160 participants planned to camp under the wings of their
planes.
Total registration for the event had topped 1,700, but closer to
3,000 attendees are expected, according to airport director Fred
Salisbury.

“It should be a packed house,” he said.

Weather forecasts should help boost attendance. The
National Weather Service predicts sunny skies and temperatures
in the high 80s this weekend.

The Bremerton event will double the size of the
AOPA Fly-In Spokane hosted in 2014, which attracted 1,500
attendees and 240 planes. (A torrential rainstorm the day before
festivities began dampened attendance.)

Big registration numbers for Bremerton are encouraging
to organizers, who believe the event will provide an economic
boost to the area.

AOPA Fly-Ins typically generate about $680,000 for the local
economy, according to the association. The conventions create
business for hotels, transportation companies, food vendors and
contractors.

Jack Edwards, manager of
Bremerton’s Baymont Inn & Suites, said roughly one-third of
his rooms (about 50 units) were booked for the weekend
by Fly-In participants. He started receiving reservations from
AOPA members as early as April.

“We’re still getting calls from them, but we’re
full,” Edwards said.

Visitors who waited until this week to book rooms
would be hard pressed to vacancies anywhere in Bremerton, he
said.

“The AOPA very prestigious national
organization and their West Coast event offers locals new
opportunities to introduce hundreds tourists to the region,”
Graf-Hoke said in an email. “Guests are filling up hotel rooms
which is good for local businesses and the economy.”

Wobbly Hopps owners Jon and Sheree Jankowski are selling the
business to fellow brewing enthusiast Jeffery Scott of Port
Orchard. Scott takes the helm Sept. 1, just in time for Blackberry Festival.

The Jankowskis originally planned to hire a professional brewer
to oversee operations at Wobbly Hopps, but that never came to pass.
Jon said the couple has too many other interests and
obligations, including full-time jobs, to carry on running the
brewery.

“I waited until someone came along who I could trust to take it
over,” Jon said.

Jeff Scott brewing at Wobbly
Hopps

Scott said he’s been homebrewing for five years and worked an
apprenticeship at Sound Brewery in
Poulsbo.

He was considering opening another brewery in downtown Bremerton
before striking a deal with the Jankowskis.

Scott will take over a five-barrel brewing system and
a lively taproom with an outdoor seating area. He’ll continue
serving Wobbly Hopps’ beers at first, while gradually adding his
own recipes to the mix.

Scott’s first beer, a “Dog With No Name IPA” is already
brewing for the Sept. 1 opening.

“I can’t wait to serve some beer to the neighborhood,” Scott
said.

Check the Wobbly Hopps and
Dog Days
Brewing Facebook pages for updates. And keep an
eye on this blog for more Bremerton brewery news coming
soon.